POWERFUL VOICES FOR KIDS: MEDIA LITERACY IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
In this workshop, you will learn about many of the ideas and activities developed in the Powerful Voices for Kids program for students between the ages of 5 and 9. You will observe classroom practice, reflect on how teacher motivations align with choices in the classroom, and think about possible strengths, challenges, and possible relevance of the work in Powerful Voices for Kids to your own practice.
(1) How teacher motivations shape classroom practice even in early elementary grades; (2) How demystifying the process of media construction can help students make sense of print and nonprint media both in and out of the classroom; (3) Why media literacy activities support inference-making and literacy development; (4) How students can expand who counts as an "author" and take pride in their own authorship through artist collaborations.
WORKSHOP OUTLINE
PART 1: WHAT'S YOUR MOTIVATION? Teachers have lots of motivations for teaching -- we have outlined 12 major motivations for media literacy education that we describe as our "media literacy horoscope." You can take our quiz to reflect on your own motivations for incorporating media and technology in your work.
PART 2: ALL MEDIA MESSAGES ARE CONSTRUCTED Children as young as five years old can begin to explore how media is constructed, even as they begin to learn the symbol systems of the written word for the first time. Particularly for children who struggle with print literacy, learning about codes and conventions in nonprint media like videos, audio, and interactive web content can support their understanding of how and why messages are created.
PART 3: MEDIA LITERACY SUPPORTS INFERENCE-MAKING Our experiences and formal research has begun to show that teaching students how to make inferences from popular culture -- the kinds of popular culture they are already familiar with, much of which they experience in visual, audio, and interactive forms -- is correlated with their reading competencies. When young students start to identify purpose and target audience in popular culture texts, they practice the kind of inference-making that is essential for their literacy development.
PART 4: MEETING REAL AUTHORS It can be difficult to foster authentic audiences for children's work -- much of which is unpolished or "practice" in writing, art-making, and media creation. But when students have a chance to experience conversations, dialogues, and critiques with real authors of books, movies, music, or websites, they gain confidence in their own authorship and see firsthand what their powerful voices can do in the world.
POWERFUL VOICES FOR KIDS: MEDIA LITERACY IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
In this workshop, you will learn about many of the ideas and activities developed in the Powerful Voices for Kids program for students between the ages of 5 and 9. You will observe classroom practice, reflect on how teacher motivations align with choices in the classroom, and think about possible strengths, challenges, and possible relevance of the work in Powerful Voices for Kids to your own practice.
(1) How teacher motivations shape classroom practice even in early elementary grades;
(2) How demystifying the process of media construction can help students make sense of print and nonprint media both in and out of the classroom;
(3) Why media literacy activities support inference-making and literacy development;
(4) How students can expand who counts as an "author" and take pride in their own authorship through artist collaborations.
WORKSHOP OUTLINE
PART 1: WHAT'S YOUR MOTIVATION?
Teachers have lots of motivations for teaching -- we have outlined 12 major motivations for media literacy education that we describe as our "media literacy horoscope." You can take our quiz to reflect on your own motivations for incorporating media and technology in your work.
PART 2: ALL MEDIA MESSAGES ARE CONSTRUCTED
Children as young as five years old can begin to explore how media is constructed, even as they begin to learn the symbol systems of the written word for the first time. Particularly for children who struggle with print literacy, learning about codes and conventions in nonprint media like videos, audio, and interactive web content can support their understanding of how and why messages are created.
PART 3: MEDIA LITERACY SUPPORTS INFERENCE-MAKING
Our experiences and formal research has begun to show that teaching students how to make inferences from popular culture -- the kinds of popular culture they are already familiar with, much of which they experience in visual, audio, and interactive forms -- is correlated with their reading competencies. When young students start to identify purpose and target audience in popular culture texts, they practice the kind of inference-making that is essential for their literacy development.
PART 4: MEETING REAL AUTHORS
It can be difficult to foster authentic audiences for children's work -- much of which is unpolished or "practice" in writing, art-making, and media creation. But when students have a chance to experience conversations, dialogues, and critiques with real authors of books, movies, music, or websites, they gain confidence in their own authorship and see firsthand what their powerful voices can do in the world.